A track day/experience as a gift - your advice please!

[ClaireLouiseH]

Hello Everyone,

I wonder if you could help me. My boyfriends birthday is looming and I know he is keen on trying a bit of track driving. He was contemplating buying an evo last year, but he decided on something a bit more economical in the end (and he moans about his sensible choice every single morning).

He is really into the idea of having a go in an Evo so I have been looking into these driving experiences that companies offer. They are fairly expensive and I have concerns that they might not be much of an experience - ie. more time talking about the car and not much time actually driving it. I realise a safety briefing is important but I dont want him to be bored and me to be 200/300 quid light!

Can anyone offer any reviews on companies who offer this kind of experience? Or perhaps a better idea for a birthday present! I am based in Devon, but could travel a fair way if the experience would be a good one!

Thanks for reading - any advice would be much appreciated.

Cheers - Claire

[Tyrewrecker]

ClaireLouiseH said:

Hello Everyone,

I wonder if you could help me. My boyfriends birthday is looming and I know he is keen on trying a bit of track driving. He was contemplating buying an evo last year, but he decided on something a bit more economical in the end (and he moans about his sensible choice every single morning).

He is really into the idea of having a go in an Evo so I have been looking into these driving experiences that companies offer. They are fairly expensive and I have concerns that they might not be much of an experience - ie. more time talking about the car and not much time actually driving it. I realise a safety briefing is important but I dont want him to be bored and me to be 200/300 quid light!

Can anyone offer any reviews on companies who offer this kind of experience? Or perhaps a better idea for a birthday present! I am based in Devon, but could travel a fair way if the experience would be a good one!

Thanks for reading - any advice would be much appreciated.

Cheers - Claire

Go for a half palmer sport day if you can stretch to the cost, worth it. Experience type days vary lots in success.

[Crackin86]

I can only speak about the driving experience i have done and that was a lambo! 6 laps and the safety brief was only about half an hour long! good day but would have been nice to have been in the car longer! This only cost £100 though so not quite as expensive...

[ClaireLouiseH]

Palmer days look pretty special! Im not sure I can afford £400, though. Yikes.

He chose an M3 over the Evo so I think he would enjoy the M3 GTP! He'd kill me if he knew I spent that amount. Or would he? Hmmm... He may find it in himself to fogive me.

Thanks for your help, both.

Claire

[Tyrewrecker]

ClaireLouiseH said:

Palmer days look pretty special! Im not sure I can afford £400, though. Yikes.

He chose an M3 over the Evo so I think he would enjoy the M3 GTP! He'd kill me if he knew I spent that amount. Or would he? Hmmm... He may find it in himself to fogive me.

Thanks for your help, both.

Claire

I believe that is the best for an actual 'push as hard as you can' rather than 'experience' driving a supercar which often have bad reports. If your budget is lower, or would prefer to sepnd less, how about caterham hire or similar?

[Steve H]

If he would like a go in an M3 then you can get the M3 experience at Palmers, Oulton or Brands Hatch for under £200, that's two 15 minute sessions in car which is more seat time than a lot of the alternatives.

He still has to have briefing and an instructor to stop him firing it into a barrier but despite some opinions to the contrary, we are not actually there just to slow people down.

[mrmr96]

ClaireLouiseH said:

Hello Everyone,

I wonder if you could help me. My boyfriends birthday is looming and I know he is keen on trying a bit of track driving. He was contemplating buying an evo last year, but he decided on something a bit more economical in the end (and he moans about his sensible choice every single morning).

He is really into the idea of having a go in an Evo so I have been looking into these driving experiences that companies offer. They are fairly expensive and I have concerns that they might not be much of an experience - ie. more time talking about the car and not much time actually driving it. I realise a safety briefing is important but I dont want him to be bored and me to be 200/300 quid light!

Can anyone offer any reviews on companies who offer this kind of experience? Or perhaps a better idea for a birthday present! I am based in Devon, but could travel a fair way if the experience would be a good one!

Thanks for reading - any advice would be much appreciated.

Cheers - Claire

This website is pretty comprehensive:
http://www.trackdays.co.uk/experience/

They basically re-sell experiences from other providers. I don't think the costs are generally loads more using this company because I /think/ their cut comes from the providers giving away a bit of their margin in order to be listed on there.

The reason it's such a good website is that you can see lots of experiences in one place, and the way they are grouped by car type etc is pretty good. Do note that they sell both trackdays (where you buy track time and take your OWN car on track) and experiences (where you just rock up and drive one of their cars with an instructor in the passenger seat). If he's just dipping a toe then an 'experience' is the one to go for.

As said, the Palmersport day is AMAZING. I did the full day a couple of years ago and it was fantastic. I've heard that some 'experience' operators will be a bit nannying with you driving, but on the Palmersport day the instructors are mad! They encourage you to push and push and push and it's a LOT of fun. You actually have more fun with them in the car pushing you on than you would do if you were in the car alone. I think one of the reasons they can egg you on like this is that the circuit has immense amounts of runoff (safe) in all bar 2 corners, and also the cars have dual controls. So they can brake for you, OR indeed use a 'reverse brake' pedal to push your foot OFF the brake if you lock up! If you can stretch to doing a half day at Palmersport it would be the best thing in the country - it's reputation is so good because it really is great. As said, I've done it and I can't recommend it highly enough, there's ZERO chance that he'd find it boring. Have a look on the website and see which half day looks most appealing, as there's two different car combinations:
http://www.palmersport.com/half-days.aspx

My recommendation would be for the "Palmersport Formula" version (rather than the "Palmersport GT" version).
Reason being that the JP-LM car is a two seater "le mans style" car which is staggeringly fast. So fast that you'd never drive it about 30% capacity without an instructor. But with the instructor with you they'll make you do things in that car which you never thought possible! You also get to drive a similar single seater car (same engine and chassis I think, but different bodywork as it's single seater style) and you get to drive that alone. Plus you get the variety of different things like the 4x4 driving, which is fun in it's own way.

If the budget won't stretch that far then there are other experiences where you'd get to drive an Evo. A company called "U Drive Cars" does Evo driving experiences, on a coned track at an airfield. So still nice and safe. I did "Evo vs. Scooby" a few years ago before buying my own Evo.
http://www.udrivecars.com/evo-driving-experiences....

You can combine various types of car, like Evos/Porsches etc. But the experience wasn't on the same level as Palmersport. It was a good chance to "have a go" in an Evo and not having done anything like it before I came away grinning. But it was a few years later when I then did Palmersport which blew me away. But as with many things in life, you get what you pay for. The Palmersport day is better, but it's considerably more expensive.

I still rave about it and it was about 3 yrs ago that I went. If you can get the money together then I'd seriously say do the Palmersport day as its _that_ unforgettable. But it is expensive.

In any case, best of luck with whatever you choose to do - it's a very lucky guy who has a wife/gf who'd buy him a driving experience of any kind as a present and I'm sure he'll be blown away/grateful whatever you end up doing. Let us know how you get on!

[paulg390]

I'm afraid its got to be Palmersport....